Journey: The Mountain
by SarcasticalCrab
Summary: A lone traveler travels to the mountain to uncover its mysteries


The Mountain

A light shines brightly from the mountain before shooting into the heavens. It becomes one with its brothers and sisters in the night sky before flying down. It soars across the sky like a shooting star, greeting all who came to see it. It descends, getting closer and closer to the ground, before landing and disappearing in the far distance. Little lights escape throughout the day but the brightest lights were always at sunrise, noontime, and just before sunset.

The mountain stood tall in the distance but was large enough where one could admire its beauty in its entirety from any distance. It was an intimidating structure, yet it happily invited all who wanted to admire it up close. It seemed to get colder, becoming a blustery tundra as one approached it and becoming hotter, seamlessly transforming into a desert, the further they stood away from it.

The landscape of tundra and desert was one filled with mystery and a lost civilization only known to time. No one knew who lived here and what happened to them. Pieces of the lost civilization were scattered all across the land and each piece painted its own picture telling a grand story once put together. The creatures that still roamed the land also tried to tell their story, by either helping or hurting whomever passes through.

The traveler came every day to the desert at sunrise to watch the first light and lingers to watch the ones at noontime and sunset. However, one day at sunset, a much smaller light escapes the mountain. The next day, at sunrise, the traveler comes and the same small light leaves the mountain. Eventually, all the lights that shot from the mountain seemed to vanish, disintegrating once it touched the clouds, no longer sailing across the sky to reach its unknown destination.

At sunrise the next day, after the first light glares, the traveler decides to travel to the mountain. As the traveler voyaged through the land, the mountain continued to send lights into the sky, each one greater and brighter than the one before it. At sunset that same day, a large, almost blinding light departs from the mountain, greeting and wishing the traveler well as it flutters across the sky.

The traveler was within of reach of the mountain, the sand beginning its flawless transformation to snow. He looked up at the towering mountain above him and watched as the stars that populated the night sky fade away one by one and the darkness give way to a mesh of orange and yellow. He waited for another light to leave the mountain to greet him. One never came.

The weather was indeed colder, gradually becoming more punishing as the traveler reached the base of the mountain. The creatures that still inhabited this land proved to be a great aid as well as a trial on his journey. There were ones that surrounded him, guiding him and trying to keep him warm until they themselves could not bear the harshness of the cold, running away to seek shelter. There were others that hunted for him, a terrifying force in the sky, ready to end the journey of those who were unworthy to see its end. The stones in the sand and snow told him that tale.

It was unbearable trying to climb the mountain with its howling winds, hostile snow and the fierce duo of thunder and lightning bearing down around him. But sheer determination refused to let the traveler go. He may not have been able to understand the mysteries of the land, but he would at least finally understand what always enticed him; What stood just below the heavens? The traveler climbed the mountain until his limbs were frozen and heart turned to crystal.

The traveler falls into the snow, the last bits of his resolve surrendering, now lost in the wind and mixing with the snow. The mountain that was once within reach disappears in the sky. The snow cools, the wind whistles a merry tune, and the thunder uttered a small, friendly rumble, wishing all a good day. At noontime, a sharp gust of wind whisks the traveler upward, pulling him from the snow and sends him soaring toward the sky.

The traveler sits in the sand and hums a song to bid farewell to the day. As the sun sets, the traveler watches as a light shines brightly from the mountain before shooting into the heavens.

The traveler wonders what causes such a phenomenon.

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 **This was an assignment for my creative writing class; write surreal or flash fiction. I feel that it can work as a stand alone as well as a piece of fanfiction, since I wrote it with the game in mind.**

 **Hope you liked it! Please review if you like.**


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